Tuesday, July 7, 2015

Sweden's Monarchy Threatens Swedes' Human Rights Commitments

The
defense of constitutional monarchies goes something like this: the remaining
royal heads of state in countries like Britain, the Netherlands, Norway,
Sweden, and Spain are so many harmless old duffers whose palaces and country
homes bring in big tourist dollars for the national economies.They exercise no real influence, but act as
gentle, apolitical symbols for national unity.They offer stability (and often pageantry and entertainment thanks to
the antics of their legions of unemployed members) to a populace that might
otherwise be inclined to view national life cynically.

But
this rose-tinted view masks the latent conservatism of many of these monarchs,
who glide in and out of limousines amongst their countries’ wealthiest citizens
who have plenty of vested interests, often interests that run counter to those
of the average citizen.Socialization
alone make monarchs inherently conservative, although admittedly in some cases
their paternalism can extend to a defence of now “traditional” elements of
national society like the welfare states in which most of them reign.

I
spent Sweden’s “National Day” in June in the company of Swedes, making, I am not
very sorry to say, many deeply un-courteous comments about the country’s royal
family, who looked jocular, if more than a little bemused at their good fortune
at having been born with a surfeit of silver spoons on their collective palate.

My
particular beef with the Swedish king was the manner in which he had been
wheeled out during a diplomatic row with Saudi Arabia as the voice of
moderation and reason…and by “reason” I mean “conservative corporate power and
the arms industry”.

It
all began when Sweden’s foreign minister described Saudi Arabia’s flogging of
blogger Raif Badawi as a “cruel attempt to silence modern forms of expression”.A reasonable criticism, on the face of it.

The
Saudis, perhaps accustomed to more genteel treatment at the hands of western
powers like the U.S. and Britain, threw a fit and prevented the foreign
minister from making a planned speech on human rights, her comments having
perhaps clued them in that not everyone views them in the same addled light as
the likes of Dick Cheney, George W Bush, and Hillary Clinton.

The
Swedish government responded by refusing to renew an arms deal with the
authoritarian regime.News of the
existence of such a deal with a regime known for suppressing dissent at home
and in neighbouring countries might come as a surprise to those who are
familiar with Sweden’s self-description as a nation committed to an activist
human rights-oriented foreign policy.But that surprise was nothing as to what the Saudis and their interlocutors
in Sweden’s business community felt.

Swedish
business leaders, led by Saab, were defiant.The business community exports almost one and a half billion dollars annually
to the regime in Riyadh and responded
with a letter hammering the government for its decision, trotting out tired
lines from the 19th-century liberal imperial playbook about the
wonders of free trade (no matter how un-free citizens in one trading society
might be) and the peaceful dividends to be reaped by selling weapons to a
regime with a history of using them to squash democratic protest.

While
King Carl Gustaf would certainly not have taken an active role without the acquiescence
of the Swedish government, he sprung into action because a particular community
in Sweden—some members of which make their fortunes through the export of
weaponry designed to enhance the security of one of the world’s worst
dictatorships—raised a fuss.That they,
and not other communities, with different concerns, can marshal the support of
an un-elected, un-accountable individual meant to represent Sweden and its
values, is deeply troubling.

This
rather sorry episode should illustrate several things.

Firstly,
that the claims of those interests in Sweden that undermine human rights
through the sale of weapons to authoritarian regimes outweigh those interests
which advocate for enhanced human rights.

Secondly,
that those Swedes who take pride in the country’s human rights record, and see
that as central to a 21st century Swedish identity, should be deeply
disturbed by the subversion of their commitment to human rights by corporate
interests, an antique institution that is anything but harmless (and which has become quintessentially modern by imbricating itself in corporate politics), and a national
economy compromised by its dependence on dictatorships.

In
a broader sense, it should demonstrate how much of foreign policy making in
most countries—with all of its repercussions for moral economies and national
security—is made not by elected representatives carrying out the wishes of
their constituents, but by affluent interests operating under very different
moral codes.

Moreover,
it illustrates the difficulty of efforts
in Sweden and elsewhere to tie exports to moral standards, when companies
and politicians alike are easily able to expoit loopholes.

Finally,
it is a reminder of the naiveté of assuming that a foreign policy based on the
personal connections between global elites makes for intelligent or moral
policymaking.Hillary Clinton recently
trotted out her personal knowledge of Vladimir Putin as reason to assume that
she will be better able to exercise powers of suasion.We should remember how her personal sympathy
for Egypt’s President Mubarak, a vicious dictator who was using violence to
remain in power, made the Obama administration take a weak and tentative
approach towards encouraging a democratic fluorescence in the Middle East,
leading to escalating violence.

Global
royalty—whether the likes of Sweden’s king or the Clintons—are hardly the
people who should be representing the global citizenry as it struggles to make
a more peaceful, democratic, and equal world a reality.

About Me

I am from Northern California, and am the fifth generation of my family to have lived in the Golden State. Now I live next-door in the Silver State, where I research and write about colonialism and decolonization in Africa, teach European, African, environmental, and colonial history, and write this blog, mostly about politics, sometimes about history, and occasionally about travels or research.